


wrap the night around me

by ketabat



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Drabble, Hurt Billy Hargrove, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Supportive Steve Harrington
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-17
Updated: 2019-07-17
Packaged: 2020-06-30 02:22:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19843567
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ketabat/pseuds/ketabat
Summary: "I'm just saying—""I don't owe you an explanation" Billy interrupts. "You offered to be my personal punchbag—""Hey!" Steve exclaims, clearly offended. "I can pack a punch too."aka the fic where steve gets billy to talk with his mouth instead of his fists.





	wrap the night around me

Some people need space when they’re overcome with anger or sadness. Some need a shoulder to cry on. Some need a drink, a cigarette or a good fuck to make them forget.

Billy, however, needs to beat someone bloody.

Thing is, ever since Steve realised how liberated Billy feels when he’s asserting dominance, he’d taken it upon himself to offer his services. Or something like that. Billy would never admit it but Steve can really put up a fight.

The first time it happened, Steve was sitting opposite of Hopper at the police station, both of them engaged in an almost tangible stare battle before Billy was stumbling in, breaking it off wordlessly.

His hair was a mess, a bruise already blooming on the plain of his cheek, and he was laughing hysterically.

Hopper wanted to call Neil, but Billy stopped him with a drawn out “naaaah”, followed by “I’ll crash at Harrington’s. I’m eighteen. Free and legal, Hop.”

Steve blinked away his shock, laughing without humour at Billy’s un-aforementioned plans. “Fine” he relented under both their gazes. “But I’m driving.”

Steve didn’t drive him back to his house. Instead, he drove him to a nearby park, empty and a little isolated from the rest of town.

He’d taken his jacket off, rolled his eyes at Billy’s “take it off, Harrington! Woo!”, then stepped closer, lifted his head, and ordered Hargrove to hit him.

“Ugh! Don’t tell me you get off on that” Billy said. But the annoyance he loaded his tone with didn’t underlay the intrigue hidden there.

“You don’t get to hit random people because you feel like it” Steve had hissed, stepping even closer, almost chest to chest, putting forth a challenge, a throwing-down of the gauntlet. “So, here I am. Hit me.”

Billy cocked a brow, regarding Steve with a slow smirk as he lifted his cigarette to his lips and took a deep drag from it.

“What? Are you scared?” Steve asked. He’d obviously been taunting him, but Billy fell for the bait all the same.

That’s how it started. It was similar to friends with benefits. Consensual and purgative. Except they engaged in physical activities much more violent. Somehow much more _intimate._ And, they definitely _weren’t_ friends.

They had both ended up bloody and exhausted, laughing breathlessly while passing a cigarette back and forth between them.

It was a cathartic release to both of them. Mutual benefit. Not meant to hurt the other as much as it’s meant to unwind.

So when Billy appeared at Steve’s front door instead of honking his car horn, Steve was surprised to put it mildly.

“I’m _not_ doing this here” he says. “We could break stuff. Valuable stuff. Stuff my parents would _kill me_ if they—” he cuts himself off when he realises Billy won’t be caving anytime soon. “Backyard” he sighs out instead.

…

Billy winds up with a busted lip and a bruise on his side. Steve on the other hand, was much more attentive and managed to dodge more blows than Billy could. He ends up with a blooming bruise on his stomach and messy hair that he’s sure the sight of would hurt him more than any other wound.

They’re laying shoulder to shoulder as they try catching their breaths.

Steve doesn’t mind the taste of blood on the cigarette when he takes a drag of it. “You good?” He asks carefully, keeping his eyes skyward.

Billy tuts his tongue. “Not in the mood for a chinwag, Harrington” he states dismissively. His voice’s hoarse, whether it’s exhaustion or emotion, Steve isn’t sure. He offers the cigarette back to him, and their hands brush when Billy takes it, making Steve clear his throat and close his eyes against the shiver that zips up his spine.

He shrugs, blinking rapidly for a second like Billy can see him. “I mean, I’m told I’m a great listener and—”

“Cut it off, Harrington” Billy interrupts, sterner this time, vexed by the sympathy he finds in Steve’s tone.

Steve snaps his mouth shut, lips puckering into an embarrassed moue before he sits up, leaning back on his arms as he looks over at Billy. “You know what I think?” He asks. It’s obviously rhetorical and he’s Steve fucking Harrington, he’s going to voice his opinion even if it’s the last thing he does.

“Don’t care” Billy deflects, still laying supine with one hand tucked under his head.

“I think half your problems would be solved if you _talked_ about them,” Steve goes on. “I mean, I’m chuffed that I’m helping with this whole…” he waves his hand in circular motions in Billy’s general direction. “Thing going on, but—”

Billy grips his wrist, not tight enough to hurt but tight enough to restrain, and stop him from talking. “You really doin’ this, Harrington? Lording it over me like I _owe_ you?”

Steve parts his lips, speechless. He tugs lightly to get his arm free, to no avail. “I’m _just_ saying—”

“I don’t owe you an explanation” Billy interrupts. “You offered to be my personal punchbag—”

“Hey!” Steve exclaims, clearly offended. “I can pack a punch too.”

Billy can’t rein in the smile that twitches his lips upwards. His grip loosens on Steve’s wrist before he lets go completely.

Steve rubs at his arm, brows furrowed in displeasure. “Asshole” he mutters. Then mumbles a series of expletives.

“My mam died today.”

Steve stills, turning his eyes away to look at Billy. “Your— Susan? What happened?”

“Not—” Billy waves a hand. “Not her.”

It takes Steve a few moments to catch on before he murmurs a drawn out ‘oh’ under his breath. He doesn’t know what else to say, doesn’t know if a sliver of sympathy will tick Billy off, so he just sits there, watching him play with a ring wrapped around his middle finger, twisting it systemically, two turns clockwise and one anti-clockwise. “That hers?”

Billy’s eyes fall shut. He doesn’t need to talk to answer.

“Billy, I—”

“I called her every day” Billy says absently. "Every fucking day. Begged her to get me out of the hell hole I’m livin in.

“I hated her for leaving,” he pauses, drifts his eyes open and turns his head to look at Steve. “Wished she’d suffer for it. And now—” he cuts himself off with a bitter laugh, shaking his head.

Steve draws his legs up to his chest, wrapping his arms around them. “What was she like?”

“Pretty” Billy answers. “Really pretty.”

Steve’s never been close with his parents, barely ever sees them, but the way Billy looks talking about his mother is enough to make him smile wistfully.

“Stubborn as a mule” Billy rasps, smiles at his own words. “Really strong” a cry wracks his body, makes him look away from Steve to take a lungful of air. “Everything I’m not” he summarises in a watery breath, licking over his lips.

Steve wants to rebut that statement.

“Never blamed her for leaving” Billy shrugs. “Just wished she took me with her.” The _I’d be a better person_ was somewhere between the lines and somehow would’ve hurt Steve much less had Billy actually voiced that thought.

They fall silent for a long time after that. Steve begins to make sense of Billy’s violent nature. It’s a defence mechanism, a shield. A way to protect himself.

Eventually, he gains sense of time and realises he’s been looking at Billy for some time, eyes laden with understanding instead of pity.

He leans over, hesitates for scarcely a second, before pressing his lips to Billy’s forehead. Billy’s breath hitches in his throat, body stiffening at the brush of Steve’s lips against his skin.

Steve’s lips linger. Even after he gets up and begins walking away, the ghost of it warming Billy to the very core.

“And uh, Hargrove?” Steve says, spinning around to look at him.

Billy can’t really find the coherency to let out a single word, so he just looks at Steve with a blink.

“You uh— you do take after her,” Steve says, waving his hand wildly before running it through his hair, trying to ground himself. He takes a deep breath and huffs it out. “Your mom, I mean. You- take after her.”

Then he turns around and walks away.

**Author's Note:**

> title taken from [this song.](https://youtu.be/ZWir6wUkPtw)


End file.
